As with so much of their composer's output, the six string quartets of Op. 50 have suffered simply from being a mere few among the many. Within this genre Haydn arguably wrote more great works in one instrumental form than any other composer; consequently he has fallen victim to his own high standards and productivity. Faced with over forty works of high quality, many of them masterpieces, our natural tendency has been to lean on the last products in the genre. The same is true of most of the forms in which Haydn wrote – the late symphonies and keyboard sonatas, for instance, have also been heavily favoured, both critically and in terms of frequency of performance. This has only so much to do with any inherent superiority over earlier efforts; more relevant here is the implication of the term used to describe the music of this whole period. As James Webster has remarked, the word Classical implies an evolutionary bias, such that each successive group of works must necessarily represent an advance over its predecessors. The last full set of six string quartets, Op. 76, has reaped the benefits of this attitude, while Opp. 20 and 33 have also received much attention, centering on a great musicological debate over which represents the first classically ‘mature’ set.

Another factor which has also worked against a truly balanced picture of Haydn's output is what is generally referred to as a ‘ceaseless experimentation’ with the shape and form of his works.